Procedures for Launching and Operating a Patent Advisory Group (PAG)

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This document specifies the procedures undertaken by the W3C Team, with the
cooperation of others, in the early stages following the surfacing of an
exception within the context of the W3C Patent Policy. In
brief, an "exception"
is a patent that has been, or may be, disclosed, and that is believed to be
essential
to implementation of a W3C Recommendation or a document on the Recommendation
track, but is not available under W3C Royalty-Free (RF) licensing
requirements. The normal results of such an exception is the launch of a
Patent Advisory Group (PAG).

The purpose of documenting the procedures here is to ensure that the Team,
the W3C Members, the Working Group (WG), the patent holder, and the public
have a clear understanding of the events that may unfold in the wake of an
exception, and the expected timeline for such events.

Procedures for Launching a PAG

Note: Some of the links to examples below are
Member confidential. The REX PAG documents are given as examples of
content, though the timeline on which they were issued was slower than
is described below. See the principles behind these
procedures.

Schedule

The following deadlines ("must") and recommended ("should") deadlines are
presented relative to the earlier of (a) the time of an exclusion within a
WG, and (b) the time that a Chair of a WG requests that a PAG be convened.

Within 30 days: The Team must initiate discussions with the WG Chair,
Team Contact and Members of the WG, as well as the patent holder, to
support development of a strategy and plan for subsequent steps.
Objectives of these discussions may include:

Ascertain the desired schedule for completing the PAG investigation
in light of the WG's plans.

Seek clarifications regarding the intent and content of the
patent(s) from the patent holder. See if they are willing to retract
their exclusion and/or offer licensing terms consistent with the
Patent Policy. (PAG will likely seek additional data from them
later.)

Explore resource needs and availability. Consider Team resources.
Explore the level of effort Members are willing to put into the PAG.
Consider the need for outside legal counsel and the willingness for
Member to help finance the necessary resources through financial
contributions to the Web Legal
Support Fund.

Within 60 days: The Team must report to the W3C
Advisory Committee on the status and plan
regarding launching a PAG.

Within 90 days: The Team should launch the PAG, unless the discussions
above provide a strong reason for an earlier launch, a later launch, or
the removal of the need to launch (e.g., the exclusion is withdrawn or W3C
Patent Policy licensing terms are granted).

Steps

The following steps must be completed prior to and at the launch of
the PAG (links to existing examples are illustrative, and not
necessarily ideal):

PAG Operations

How a PAG operates will depend largely upon its charter, the evolution of
the facts and circumstances associated with the exception, and the Member
initiatives. A subset of things to keep in mind during PAG operations:

Principles Behind These Procedures

The principles behind the launch procedures are derived from the
W3C Patent Policy, and in particular, Section 7
on Exception Handling.

When to start the PAG depends on the situation; but earlier is
generally better than later. The timing of the launch of a PAG is at the
discretion of the Director, based on consultation with the Chair of the
relevant Working Group. The start of the PAG could be as early as before a exceptional patent
it disclosed, to as late as during the Last Call or Candidate
Recommendation stages. The goal is to start the PAG at a time when it is
believed that the patent licensing problems can be best resolved [Section
7.4.1].

The Working Group should continue to operate.
W3C should act so as to allow
the relevant Working Group
to keep working while the exception is being handled [Section
7.1], and to handle the exception effectively such that the group's
work
can continue with a high-level of certainty that their products will be
implementable on RF licensing terms [Section
2]. Delays in addressing the exception could effect the motivation
for the WG to move forward. Conclusions of the PAG and any subsequent,
related actions by the Director and the AC should be completed before the
specification in question is proposed to move to Proposed Recommendation
[FAQ
29].

All Members represented in the WG are members of the PAG. This
is not something to which a Member signs up for or resigns from, though a
Member may designate an alternate and/or additional people to participate
[Section
7.3].

The level of access control for the PAG's main work is the same as
that of the underlying WG [Section
7.4.2].

W3C will keep the public informed. As soon as the PAG is convened, the
PAG charter will be made public, along with all of the patent disclosure
and licensing statements applicable to the WG [Section
7.4.2].